Dear friends of the Russia & America Good Will Association (www.raga.org) and antiwar colleagues!

In my previous RAGA Antidote 36, I promised to reduce information overload for the Labor Day holiday. Alas, a number of natural and political hurricanes and tornado in the USA force me to urgently issue emergency Antidote 37.

First, my condolence goes to East Texas hit by the terrible Harvey hurricane. I am rather partial to the people of Texas whom I have always liked for the independence of mind and who treated me well when I lived there. Now I hear that some of my friends' houses were destroyed. In fact, I started my career in Texas, became US citizen, and both of my children were born there. I started as an instructor of Russian Studies at the University of Texas, Austin, then became professor at the SMU in Dallas before moving to Monterey, California in 1978.

As if by accident, my UT Austin office was in Robert E Lee Hall. My first thought was how great America was that it managed to heal the trauma of Civil War not by summary execution or endless repression of the defeated, as was done after the civil war in the USSR, but by treating the vanquished fairly, giving them credit for military skills and noble behavior, as the film "Gone With the Wind" wonderfully portrays. Moreover, after the demise of the USSR, during the 1990s I went several times to interpret for the US-Russia joint program in Houston NASA Center as part of the International Space Station mission. I am sorry to hear that the NASA building sustained heavy damages.

Harvey is not just a natural disaster. It is also a colossal failure of political leadership of US government which wastes time and resources on hunting witches abroad but neglects the primary duties at home. The best analysis I have seen is this:

To remind the government of its domestic duties, I signed a petition calling on the Trump administration to restore Pres. Obama's flood safety rules, which would protect future infrastructure from increased sea level rise and flooding. Will you join me?https://act.credoaction.com/sign/flood-rules?referring_akid=a285703520.3406495.YxKuks&source=conf_email&aktmid=tm47208369.sFw0GV&akid=a285703520.3406495.YxKuks&t=1

The same author, Stephen Lendman of Chicago, reminds the Trump administration of its international duties as well, especially when they attack diplomatic facilities of a foreign nation in the manner of tornado. Global Research, September 03, 2017.

On Saturday, FBI agents searched their premises, a flagrant Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations violation. Under Article 22(1), “(t)he premises of the mission shall be inviolable. The agents of the receiving State may not enter them, except with the consent of the head of the mission.” Article 22(3) states:“The premises of the mission, their furnishings and other property thereon and the means of transport of the mission shall be immune from search, requisition, attachment or execution.”http://www.globalresearch.ca/russia-protests-us-searches-of-its-diplomatic-facilities/5607229

You might recall that last time, in a non-partisan spirit, I defended President Trump against the storm of media criticism he sustained for his comments on violence in C-ville <<Whether we like him or not, we have to give him respect and support that our Constitution requires so that he could carry out his duties. Instead, the MSM harps at him for suggesting an even-handed course to stem violence between the radical Right and the revolutionary Left.>> I cited Peter Beinart's article The Rise of the Violent Left. Antifa’s activists say they’re battling burgeoning authoritarianism on the American right. Are they fueling it instead?​

As it turns out, Beinart's criticism of Antifa's violent ideology was seconded by other analysts

How ‘Antifa’ Mirrors the ‘Alt-Right’. By Chris Hedges, August 29, 2017 "Information Clearing House"Editor’s note: A Berkeley, Calif., rally organized by a right-wing group turned violent Sunday after arrival of a group that carried an anarchist banner.http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/47717.htm#.Wab6B_cEJ6I.email

August 29, 2017 "Information Clearing House" - Behind the rhetoric of the “alt-right” about white nativism and protecting American traditions, history and Christian values is the lust for violence. Behind the rhetoric of antifa, the Black Bloc and the so-called “alt-left” about capitalism, racism, state repression and corporate power is the same lust for violence. The two opposing groups, largely made up of people who have been cast aside by the cruelty of corporate capitalism, have embraced holy war. Their lives, battered by economic misery and social marginalization, have suddenly been filled with meaning. They hold themselves up as the vanguard of the oppressed. They arrogate to themselves the right to use force to silence those they define as the enemy. They sanctify anger.http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/47717.htm#.Wab6B_cEJ6I.email

Even the heavily anti-Trump The Washington Post turned around and put Antifa's violence on the level with the "white racists"

BY MARC A. THIESSEN, The Washington Post, SEPTEMBER 03, 2017 11:00 AMhttp://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/op-ed/article170645147.htmlLast weekend in Berkeley, California, a group of neo-communist antifa — “anti-fascist” — thugs attacked peaceful protesters at a “No to Marxism in America” rally, wielding sticks and pepper spray, and beating people with homemade shields that read (I kid you not) “No Hate.”...And let’s be clear: Totalitarian is precisely what they are. Mark Bray, a Dartmouth lecturer who has defended antifa’s violent tactics, recently explained in The Post, “Its adherents are predominantly communists, socialists, and anarchists” who believe that physical violence “is both ethically justifiable and strategically effective.” In other words, they are no different from neo-Nazis...http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/op-ed/article170645147.html

Last night I watched a weekly news review by Dmitry Kiselev, the anchorman of ROSSIIA TV station. He talked about the withdrowal of the film "Gone with the Wind" from a Memphis movie theater. The Orpheum Theatre Group made the decision after patrons took issue with the screening of the movie starring Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara.

Kiselev wondered if the Americans of today are not doing what the Russians did 100 years ago with the onset of the Communist "October" revolution: by erasing Tsarist monuments they initiated a period of unspeakable violence and nihilistic rage that spared no one, including, in the Stalinist purges two decades later, the most ardent revolutionaries. Kiselev mused in a fatherly tone that we, the Russians, have learned the hard way that hatred and rage is not a way for a better future. Aren't Americans repeating our mistakes?

Notice also that the Bolshevik usurpation of power in Petrograd hundred years ago in November 1917 was called officially The Great October Socialist Revolution. Yes, the Communists in Russia always portrayed themselves as the vanguard of world revolution, without any national identification. They were against any national tradition, customes, religion, and patriotism; they were for the liberation of humanity from capitalist oppression and imperialist domination. Their ideology was explicitly Western based on the writings of German political thinkers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Their political leaders, Lenin and Stalin, were but transplants of Marx and Engels on Russian soil. That is why when I wrote in the late 1980s my book "Russia Beyond Communism: A Chronicle of National Rebirth", I emphasized that for Russia, to move forward, she needs first go back to save and nurture the roots of her pre-revolutionary history and culture, including Russian Christianity, largely erased by the brutal utopian Communist misrule.

At about the same time, George Will, a well-known conservative Washington Post columnist, quipped that there were more firely Marxists at Harvard University than in the USSR. Of course, it was an exaggeration, but it underscored the fact that Marxism and Communism are not just Russian or Chinese problem but an intellectual desease of Western civilization with its faith in the omnipotence of scientifically approved violence to resolve all problems of mankind and, certainly, to get rid of capitalism, racism, imperialism, inequality and poverty. As all my academic career was in the States, I knew of wide-spread infestation of academic ranks with such Marxist thinking.

In 1978, I published in the conservative "Modern Age" magazine an essay titled "Karl Marx as Dr. Frankenstein" in which I drew the analogy between Dr. Frankenstein endeavoring to create an artificial man but succeding only in producing a measerable monster and Communist efforts to impose an ideal society by force, but producing only an utopian society controlled by totalitarian rulers and isolated by the Iron Curtain. Mary Shelley envisioned correctly that the misadventure of Western "science" will be dumped in the wilderness of Russia and Tartaria. Alas, none of the dozens of attempts to convert Shelley's vision to a film came even close to her spiritual insights: all stayed on the level of horror entertaintment. https://www.academia.edu/28227073/Karl_Marx_as_Frankenstein_Toward_a_Genealogy_of_Communism_Modern_Age_WINTER_1978_-_VOL._22_NO._1._pp._72-82_Vladislav_Krasnov_-_See_more_at_https_home.isi.org_karl-marx-frankenstein-toward-genealogy-communism_sthash.MmTrb2DQ.dpuf

It is wrong to think that the demise of the USSR and dissolution of Soviet Blok put the end to the ravages of Marxist ideological virus. The failures of neo-liberal economics and Neo-Con politics in the US and Europe in the past 25 years can only stimilate the growth of an anti-globalist movement which may rescucitate Marxist ideology of violent world revolution. I hope, however, that those struggling for a just, equitable, free, peaceful and healthy Planet will not resort to violence as their Communist predessors did; and that they will be governed by higher principles and the ideas of such wise and moral people like Lev Tolstoy, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Mandela and John Avery, a more recent Nobel Peace Prize winner from Denmark. I also recommend Dr. Lev Semashko, a Russian anti-Marxist philosopher who 12 years ago founded the Global Harmony Association that unites in a peace movement a number of prominent thinkers from India, UK, Denmark, Kazakhstan, Germany,France, Brasil, Algeria, Israel, the USA, and a dozen more countries. John Avery is one of the GHA's patrons.http://peacefromharmony.org/?cat=home

I also recommend a thoughtful and imaginative article by my friend and RAGA associate Israel Shamir. Like myself he is a former Soviet citizen. After emigrating to Israel, he quickly became disenchated with this Zionist "home for the Jews". Mr. Shamir has been since a daring, resolute and well-informed critic of Netanyahu's right-wing Zionist policies. Read now about their interplay with the US politics and global situation. Below are some highlights:

The Pink Revolution and How to Beat ItISRAEL SHAMIR • AUGUST 26, 2017 • 2,200 WORDS • 94 COMMENTS • http://www.unz.com/ishamir/the-pink-revolution-and-how-to-beat-it/ <<Colour revolutions usually occur only in the countries blessed with a US diplomatic presence. You need an American embassy to find the perspective ruler to be uplifted by a human swell and placed on the throne; you need an American embassy to bring in enough cash to cover expenses of the organised mayhem; you need an American diplomat to protect the revolutionaries and to order the present dictator to desist. Could it be that there is now an American Embassy in America?.... People close to power in the US know or feel the global hegemony. Its bearers are heavily Jewish liberal groups, who use their PC, their hostility to the Church, their approval of gender flux in order to undermine the mind and mentality of an ordinary American, of a redneck, of a working class Goy (as in the Goy, Bye headline). They ceaselessly tease and annoy this goy, in order to cause his premature acts of rebellion to be easily squashed. ..... Hegemonists have their own storm troops – Antifa. This extremist movement was born in Germany. There they walk on the streets on the anniversary of Dresden bombings with Israeli flags and chant: “Death to Germany! Long live Bomber Harris” (the British commander of the Air Force, a big fan of the carpet bombing of Germany). They managed to terrorize the Germans: as soon as someone objects they call their opponent a Nazi and beat him up. And if they encounter resistance, the police comes to the rescue. That’s why in Germany resistance to the mass inflow of migrants was almost imperceptible. It is spoken about in the kitchen, but not on the streets. And now Antifa came to America. They have the same mode of action as in Germany. Whoever is against them is a Nazi, or a “white racist”. They proved their mettle in Charlottesville, the city blessed with the Jewish mayor who chose the city police. Many Jewish activists came to participate, from as far as Boston. After the scuffle, the newspapers raised a hue and cry: Nazis attack Jews! President Trump condemned both sides participating in the brawl‚ both white nationalists and Antifa. It is exactly what his opponents were waiting for. His attempt to stay above the brawl was doomed to defeat: liberal hegemonists immediately branded him a racist and neo-Nazi....It is easier to turn the racism weapon against the adversary, for the Jewish adversary of Trump is as racist as any KKK member is likely to be, or worse. Last week it became known, that in Israel, Jewish settlers established a road sign saying: “The area where you are located is under Jewish control. The entry of Arabs is absolutely forbidden and constitutes a mortal danger to you!” You couldn’t find such signs in the Deep South even in Jim Crow days! Was there any response from “antiracist” American Jews? (This is a rhetoric question)......If you want to troll them a bit, call for removal of a memorial for a Jewish slave-driver David Levy Yulee, who was called “the Florida Fire Eater” for his inflammatory pro-slavery rhetoric in the U.S. Senate. He resigned his US Senate seat to support the Confederacy, but his statue still stands high in Fernandia, Amelia Island, Florida, reports Michael Hoffman who notes that neither the ADL nor the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) called for it removal. This is the time to demand Florida to overturn its (year 2000) designation of Yulee a “Great Floridian”....I’d advise president Trump: Appeal to the better side of human nature. If your fellow Americans want less racism, give it to them – by rejecting Zionism. And proceed with your agenda.>>

Lyndon LaRouche on August 30 called for a "sea change" in policy "right now." He called for the immediate creation of a national credit institution for new, high-technology infrastructure, like that employed by Franklin Roosevelt when the vast majority of our current infrastructure was built. There is no alternative to creating a national credit institution, like that employed by Alexander Hamilton and in accord with our Constitution, to fund the necessary trillions in new infrastructure investment. There must also be action on reinstating Glass-Steagall banking separation right now, as a new financial crisis looms and Wall Street speculation continues to prevent actual productive investment. Allowing Wall Street to eliminate the Glass-Steagall Act in the 1990s led to a crash that caused $10 trillion in lost wealth, mass unemployment, and untold loss and shortening of human lives.

Ed Lozansky writes in The Washington Times about "Lost opportunity" in US-Russia relations after the collapse of the USSR: By Edward Lozansky - - Tuesday, August 29, 2017 ANALYSIS/OPINION: <<Are we preparing for the war with Russia over Ukraine? That’s how it looks if you saw in the news how U.S. Marines regularly do simulated battles with Russian-speaking insurgents. This is taking place in North Carolina and Germany, but the assumed country is Ukraine, where some American troops have established a combat training center staffed by Ukrainians and reportedly capable of hosting an entire brigade. While the Pentagon, the State Department and Congress are pushing for the sale of “lethal defensive weapons” to Ukraine, the U.S. Navy is establishing in the former Russian Black Sea port of Ochakov (now Ukraine) a center “to deliver flexible maritime capabilities throughout the full range of military operations.”>>

Ed is right: <<When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, America had a historic opportunity to transform its top enemy into an ally, thus repeating two successful parallel experiences with Germany and Japan. Russia was ready for this, but the Washington establishment was not. The “end of history” that entailed total U.S. domination over world affairs had no room for Russia’s integration with the West as an equal partner.

Moreover, Washington’s strategic planning included continuous weakening of Russia through its encirclement with new NATO members from the former Soviet republics and East European countries, helping Russian oligarchs take over the economy and move capital abroad, supporting domestic opposition and even encouraging regional separatism, as in Chechnya.>>

Finally, as before, I let my friend and RAGA associate William Brumfield, Tulane University Professor of Russian Studies, to entertain you on Labor Day with photography of the beautiful Tsarist Russia church architecture the major part of which was destroyed, desecrated or abused during Soviet rule.

Juxtaposition of early 20th-century photographs from the Sergei Prokudin-Gorsky Collection (Library of Congress) with photos of same monuments from William C. Brumfield Collection (National Gallery of Art, Dept. of Image Collections).

​All statements in this report are an opinion of the author. Act at your own risk. Russia & America Goodwill Association (RAGA) is not responsible for the content of the article. Any views or opinions presented in this report are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RAGA. Any liability in respect to this communication remain with the author.